I guess it wasnt clear... I was talking about laptops in my comparison... desktops and servers are different.... In those case (and even in the laptops) I wouldnt buy a dell...
Jamie On Saturday 15 November 2003 07:34 pm, T. Joseph Carter wrote: : On Sat, Nov 15, 2003 at 12:35:06PM -0500, Linux Rocks! wrote: : > : On Fri, Nov 14, 2003 at 11:25:03PM -0800, Bob Miller wrote: : > : > > When Havoc is done with Gnome 2.6, it will have only one button : > : > > labelled "Do stuff". : > : > : > : > You say that like it's a bad thing. Why exactly did you buy a Mac, : > : > again? : > : > well... a person should use whatever computer they like best... If I : > wasnt paying for it, Id probably have a titanium 15" (or 17") : : Yeah, but the Ti 15 is getting a bit dated now and did feel a little : flimsy. The Al 15 and 17 are very nice machines, but if you wanted to run : Linux on them, the Albooks (all three sizes) contain stuff for which no : open source driver exists. The first thing you'd notice is the lack of : support for 802.11g. There also isn't a traditional PCMCIA slot (because : you already have everything you'd put into PCMCIA onboard anyway), so you : would have to try to find a way to physically get an Airport Card into the : port designed for the smaller Airport Extreme card. : : If you are going to run it as a mac, it's good to leave it like it is. : : > Although the performance difference between the fastest pc, and fastest : > mac is really neglegable (either will do the same things just about as : > fast... ) the mac claiming the g5 is the fastest computer on the planet : > seemd pretty lame... Heres PC mag's benchmarks... : > http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,4149,1274637,00.asp : : Note that "fastest computer on the planet" wasn't in my list. =) The : very day the G5 test results came back and showed the dual G5 to be faster : than anything the competition had which wasn't classified as a server : machine, immediately some midrange dual processor servers began to get : reclassified as "ultra-high-end desktop" machines to rival the G5's speed : (at higher than G5 costs, I note..) The November issue of Macworld even : shows that these ultra-high end desktop PCs are notably faster than the G5 : for Microsoft Office (you're surprised that Office runs better under : Windows right?) and the same with Adobe Premiere. (They didn't test : against Final Cut Pro, and they cited that indeed it is widely accepted : that Final Cut Pro is a much better program - but there's no equivalent on : the PC..) : : There were some places that the G5 did not do so well, which surprised the : reviewers. Didn't surprise me because the software is pre-G5 and still : ran well enough. Recompile it with a G5 target and it'll smoke Windows in : benchmarks.. ;) : : Of course, we know that there are lies, damned lies, and benchmarks. : Apple's fastest desktop claim was made based on a test performed in August : (later tests have not been made because it would no longer be quite : true..) The only thing that is true is that you're not likely to notice : 20ms difference for some of the big tasks, and for the things which : require several seconds or even minutes (complex rendering and the like), : a few extra seconds either way won't matter PC or Mac. : : > Looks to me it kind of depends on what your doing... I also read (but : > cannot confirm) that apples benchmarking was simular to the benchmarking : > linux/NT a few years back... : : The testers documented exactly how they tested. The claims that the : testing was skewed are: : : 1. Apple used a malloc they don't use in MacOS X normally that trades RAM : efficiency for speed. : - True, and they shipped the G5 with a "MacOS X 10.2.7" designed only : for the G5. The malloc tested was the malloc shipped. (This is the : reason why I feel like the machine is not as fast as it should be : when I really push it - too easily starts swapping..) Wasting RAM : for speed is a common speed optimization - ask any game programmer : today how much RAM they could save if they game didn't have to run at : 60 FPS on their hardware target. : 2. Hyperthreading was disabled on the fastest Intel box : - True again. Turns out that Hyperthreading was skewing the results : AGAINST Intel (ie, slowing the Intel box down), so they turned it : off, according to Apple. Apple offered the Hyperthreading scores but : I do not know if they have been independently verified. : 3. All of the code that mattered was compiled for the 64 bit G5 itself : using an optimizing compiler. The Intel boxes weren't subject to the : same optimizing. : - The compiler was gcc which _is_ good, but it's not THAT good. And : yeah, the tests were compiled for the G5 using a G5 target. I do not : know what compiler was used in Windows, probably VC++. gcc comes : with every G5 sold, VC++ is a seperate (expensive) add-on. VC++ is, : though, the standard Win32 compiler. Comparing gcc's generated code : (normal on the G5) to VC++'s (normal in Windows) is indeed a fair : comparison IMO. You can get better optimized Win32 compilers, but : they're far from standard issue. : 4. As soon as the benchmarks were published, they were obsolete. The : claims made by Apple based on those benchmarks are a PR move and : nothing more. : - Well duh. This differs from any other benchmark how? ;) : : > I see PC's having a much more robust hardware market, and much lower : > prices (aprox 1/2 the cost of the comparable mac). : : Really? : : Let's see what Dell has to say. : : Dimension 8300 desktop : 3GHz Pentium 4 w/ 800MHz FSB (comparable 900MHz FSB not available) : Windows XP Pro : 120 GB Serial ATA drive (comparable 160GB SATA not available) : Floppy drive (Dell recommended, but not included by default) : 4x DVD+RW (Macs use -RW or +-RW drives, always burn -R(W) though) : Dell recommended CD/DVD software : Standard keyboard : Optical mouse : Productivity Pack (WordPerfect and MS Money, not removable, "free") : 20.1" flat panel : GeForceFX 5200 Ultra (perfect match!) : SB Audigy2 card (digital sound capability) : MS Plus! Digital Media Edition (equivalent of part of iLife) : Dell Picture Studio (not removable) : RealOne Player (not removable ;) sorry) : Dell Movie Studio Essentials (another part of iLife) : 56k Telephony modem : Gigabit ethernet card : : $2824 : : I think I was reasonably fair in my selections. I chose not to select the : additionally priced options unless it was to try and match the G5's specs : (ie, the Audigy2, the various softwares, Gigabit ethernet) though I did : take a wild guess about the CPU. I don't know if the 3.0GHz or 3.2GHz is : more appropriate for comparison the G5 1.8GHz, so I went with the cheaper : option. When the exact feature on the G5 was not available, I opted for : the next peg down which Dell did offer (120GB drive instead of 160..) : Some things I do not know about and am simply assuming are present on the : Dell (like USB 2.0). Other features you just can't get from Dell (PCI-X). : Matching specs with the G5 more closely (which would mean upgrading both : systems significantly) would have been a far more even price. : : One caveat: This price is Dell's only price for home, small business, and : education. Apple cuts their prices by a couple hundred for students and : schools. The comparable Apple would probably be a few hundred more in a : retail pricing comparison between Apple and Dell, but we're starting to : see discounts and bundles on G5s. : : A comparable PC is NOT 1/2 the price. However, it's not really possible : to get an expandable mac with the basic featureset you can get from the : average PC. : : - Do you need SATA, really? No? Cut the price by .. lots : - Do you need Firewire and video editing? About $40 off : - Do you need a 20.1" LCD? (Optional in either case, but Dell's LCD is a : lot cheaper than Apple's even if it's not widescreen and it's almost as : nice in terms of screen quality - I refuse to go back to CRTs!) : - Do you need the iLife equivalents? (You'd be surprised how easy they : are to use and how useful they are once you've seen them, but they : aren't free on a PC..) : - Cheap analog sound works fine for most people, 24 bit digital isn't : really _required_, so save a little money.. : - Can _any_ version of Windows really be equated with a unix-based OS? : : As standard, the Dell costs slightly less than half of how I configured : it, but I was matching features. If you don't have to do that, you can : get a cheaper PC. You can get a similarly priced eMac or iMac, but you : know, those machines just aren't very tinkerable. : : The commodity hardware edge definitely goes to the PC since it'll be : January before upgrades to the G5 are even likely to be announced. Those : upgrades will be bad-ass. but the G5 price point will be maintained most : likely. So it really does matter what you want. : : _______________________________________________ : EuG-LUG mailing list : [EMAIL PROTECTED] : http://mailman.efn.org/cgi-bin/listinfo/eug-lug -- On a normal ascii line, the only safe condition to detect is a 'BREAK' - everything else having been assigned functions by Gnu EMACS. -- Tarl Neustaedter _______________________________________________ EuG-LUG mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mailman.efn.org/cgi-bin/listinfo/eug-lug
